Welcome to the alt.talk.royalty FAQ lexicon. The words in the following
list are
included here as a guide to their counterparts in various languages. To
attempt to
give the different meaning of each and every word in each and every situation
for
various countries or indeed to list who ranks above or below or next to whom
would create a very lengthy section. For example, the word "duke"
has different
interpretations depending on the country in which it finds itself: there
are royal
dukes (HRH The Duke of York, in Great Britain, SAR le duc d'Orléans,
in France),
noble dukes (His Grace The Duke of Norfolk, in Great Britain, le duc
d'Harcourt,
in France), sovereign dukes (HRH Duke of Parma, in what is now Italy),
so on
and so forth.

Some words are mere translations and do not necessarily indicate that they
actually
existed as a title (for example: Vizegraf is German for Viscount but
it has never
existed as a German title unlike the British or French versions). Further,
while certain
words are not in the Lexicon, this does not mean they did not exist
(Erbgraf, which
is German for Hereditary Count, for example).

Note: eight languages are showcased (English, French, German, Italian,
Spanish,
Portuguese, Dutch and Russian). They are displayed in groups of three tables
which are
divided into three or four languages: